It wasn't a good morning. As I opened my eyes all of the memories of the day before came rushing back.
/That wasn't a dream./
It was early really though. I knew I couldn't have gotten that much sleep because I still felt the tiredness from last night. Looking around the room, everything was pretty dark but I could hear muffled noises from outside my door.
/The sun hasn't even risen yet./
I stretched, and just as I was about to get up I heard a loud knock at my door. Whoever was knocking was quite impatient, they weren't giving me any time to get myself together or even fully wake up. When I opened the door it turned out to be Ace who was waiting for me.
"Oh good, you're up," he spoke dryly.
/Did this man have any kindness?/
"Yeah, I am. Did you need something? It's kind of early."
"Yes...Did you think I was knocking for fun?"
"Okay. So what do you want?"
"They've insisted on having a meeting, so we're going downstairs."
In what world was a conversation like this okay? Did he think I was just going to nod my head dumbly and do what I was told?
"Umm no. Firstly, it's too early for that, don't you think? Secondly, when was this planned?"
"Don't ask me questions girlie, the important thing is that you hurry up. You're the only one still in one of these rooms anyway."
He started walking down the hallway towards the elevator.
/Where is he going?/
There was no way the cafeteria was open and there wasn't anything on the third floor. I watched him press the elevator button and look back my way.
"HURRY UP WE DON'T HAVE ALL DAY!"
The problem was that we probably did have all day, we had all the time in the world actually. It's not as if we could be doing much of anything else really. I reluctantly followed him, it likely wasn't a great idea to isolate myself from the only people who could potentially help me. The elevator ride was awkward, Ace was someone who was unsurprisingly uncomfortable to be around. Probably because he was very prone to letting you know he didn't want to be around you.
/God, he's the worst kind of elderly./
We exited the elevator on the first floor and just to the side of the doors I could see the rest of the group. They had somehow all managed to fit on and around three couches with Axel facing them on the opposite wall. Up until my arrival, they were probably talking about something that I wasn't awake for because when Ace and I stepped out they all stopped talking to look at me. It was awkward how they weren't saying anything, were they still uncomfortable around me? Maybe it was because they didn't know me well. Ace walked over to the rest of the group and gave Axel a look prompting the younger man to clear his throat and start talking.
"So we all know why we're here, yes?" He asked.
/No?/
Various heads began to nod as others made some kind of affirming sound. Perfect.
"Alright, so we've gotta start planning. Celeste, how much time do we have?"
The girl almost jumped at the mention of her name before confidently speaking. It appeared like she had gotten better since last night.
"We have about an hour thirty until the announcement for breakfast I believe."
"Good, we need to start going over ideas. Have you guys thought over things since our last talk?"
It was at that moment that everyone began talking over each other with their own thoughts on how to handle everything. It was good that they were taking things more seriously, but most of their ideas had flaws or didn't make sense. It was after a few minutes of unorganized idea-sharing that Malachi broke through the noise.
"Would you all just SHUT UP!"
The group came to a stop to pay attention to whatever he had to say.
"Why are we even talking about this anyways? We already agreed to just wait for the cops to show," he said, clearly irritated.
"Well that was before our kidnapper told us to kill each other, now we must act accordingly," Tadashi interjected.
"Shut the fuck up four-eyes, it's not like you'd be useful even if we had a solid plan."
Tadashi gasped quite audibly, others sighed. I hadn't seen much of Malachi the day before, but apparently, he was quite the character on his own. The conversation wasn't very productive but it continued anyways. There was some yelling from the more outspoken members of the group while quieter members only truly chimed in when they strongly agreed or disagreed.
"But really, what if we just didn't do anything?"
All heads turned to that guy, I couldn't remember his name for the life of me. He was an enigma of a person and I had really only saw him a couple of times. He had everyone's attention now though, he started to speak slowly and honestly, and what he was saying made sense.
"We know that the authorities are on their way, and we had already agreed that we would hold out until they arrived," he started "Plus I'm pretty sure she said she wouldn't kill us either so there's nothing wrong with doing nothing right?"
/Right, we just had to have faith in our rescue./
"Wrong."
The bald kid, Mika, started speaking. He was sitting on the floor, I didn't think he had been listening considering how dazed he looked.
"She didn't say that Lin, she said that if nobody died then she'd kill the person we voted for. We have a week." He looked pretty serious about it too.
The man, Lin, laughed lightly.
"A week is more than enough time, right? There isn't a need to worry about a future that won't manifest."
"Hmm… If you say so."
The kid shot him an uncertain look before receding back into himself letting Lin continue. And he did.
"Besides, if worse comes to worse Axel will probably have a plan."
Axel laughed at that, and so did a few of the others. The flow of ideas continued except there was a considerable amount of additional jokes. The atmosphere was lighter somehow. It was like they had all gained their spunk from two days ago. I somehow managed to find myself joining them. This group was very good at keeping morale.
It was strange how time passed here, even though it felt long only a short amount of time had passed. But it wasn't in the way a long amount of time felt grueling, rather it was in the way a long amount of time felt fulfilling. We continued to talk but the topic eventually switched from planning on getting out to making small jokes and telling stories about the past as well as the future of when they would get out. At that point I began to zone out, letting their personal anecdotes go in one ear and out of the other.
I let my thoughts wander, I thought about Adam and about that woman. I also thought about the people here; they were all characters of their own. While some were more visibly colorful than the others they all seemed rather unique. I wondered how they all got here. None of them seemed to run in the same crowds, nor did they live similar lives. It could've been a coincidence that they managed to get here but that just didn't feel right.
Something about this place felt off-putting. Outside of the very staged environment, there was something about the circumstances that felt too meticulous. There were timed meals, individual rooms, and key cards with our names on them. Everyone's dietary needs seemed to be met and they somehow had all of our important possessions. There was no way that any of these things were random but, I just couldn't make sense of what it was that led me to getting involved with any of this.
There wasn't anything I had done that would warrant such a thought through kidnapping, not alone, and especially not involving anybody else here. It didn't seem rational to go to such lengths, we didn't even have anything in common. Maybe there wasn't anything we needed to have in common and we were just the product of bad luck.
An uneasiness settled in my stomach as I continued to think it over. Something about all of it made no sense. There had to be something I was missing.
It wasn't until the alarm for breakfast went off that I tuned myself back in.
I watched as the group got up and slowly filled themselves into the cafeteria.
As everyone began to sit down at the table I felt a hand grab my shoulder stopping me from following them.
"We need to talk."
It was Axel.
I turned around to see Axel as well as Ace to my own surprise. They both looked at me with desperation. I couldn't figure out what it was they needed. They were fine earlier, how come they looked so terrible now?
"What do you two want?" I asked.
He looked past me, at the rest of the group, before he carefully started speaking.
"We're gonna try and kill that lady."
/What. The. Fuck./
"What. Murder is illegal, you know that right?"
How could he just say that. When had he started thinking like this?
"Of course I do, it's just that this may be our only option," He sighed as continued. "We have to do something, Ingrid. As far as we know there's no way out and we don't have a lot of time to figure out what's going on."
"But she's dangerous."
"That's exactly why we have to act fast. The longer we wait, the worse it'll get. There are already more people here than there were yesterday."
"Killing her would make us no better than her Axel, we can get out of this without stooping to her level."
"People don't get far by taking moral high ground girlie," Ace Interjected. "We've got to fight fire with fire."
They made a good point. While the idea of her scared me, the things they were saying made sense. But it still felt too rushed, there was no reason why we should give up on our faith in the authorities who were looking for us.
"But shouldn't we just wait for the authorities?"
"We can't," said Ace.
"And why not?"
"There's no way they're looking for us."